V 





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Class3-Y 4-C334 
Book lx3 

Copyright W 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



tKfje ^otoer of l.obe 



A LECTURE BY FATHER L. J. VAUGHAN 



M 




Publisher 

HOLBROOK-BARKER CO. 

STEINWAY HALL 

CHICAGO 






|uftfiARYofCOf«IRESSj 
I Two Cooles Received ' 

I AUG 8 »90f 

, CooyneHt Entry 






COPY i3. 



Copyright 

Holbrook-Barker Co. 

1907 



TO MY FRIENDS 

The Lecturegoers 

of America 



,V3 



• •• 



• • 



• .* 



Press of 

Kenfield Publishing Co. 

Chicago 



Wi^t ^otoer of ilobe 

My dear friends, Fm glad to see so many of 
you present to review with me the sweetest 
story of life, and, though I came to you wnth 
joy, now, as I stand here looking out on your 
expectant faces, there comes back to me a feel- 
ing I often experience when an audience looks 
to me for a word from God. 

I cannot help tonight asking myself the 
question: "Why have you come out to hear 
me speak, to hear a human voice echo and re- 
echo through a building reared up by the 
hands of man, while the voice of God is 
rolling through the universe teaching such les- 
sons, unraveling such wonders, disclosing 
such mysteries, as never entered into mind of 
man to conceive, or power been given to the 
human tongue to manifest?'^ 

Friends, when you have wearied of my voice, 
and in my own weak way I have told you the 
story of love, don't feel that that story is all 
ended. Go out tonight and stand under God's 
beautiful blue vaulted dome of heaven,, stud- 
ded with myriads of twinkling stars, like tiny 
lanterns hung out by angels' hands to win your 
soul from earth to heaven, and standing there 
alone the voice of God rolling on through the 
universe will echo through your soul, whisper- 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

ing out of the starry skies the everlasting, un- 
ending love of God. Delve down, if you will, 
with your sciences, into the very bosom of 
mother earth, and there, written by the finger 
of the same Eternal God, you will find on 
the very foundation stone of earth the same old 
story of love. To me it is written on every 
page of God's book of nature. To me it is 
traced in the golden sunlight of day; it is 
sung in the love-songs of the birds ; 'tis whis- 
pered in the sighing of the trees, the rippling 
of the brooks, painted in the varying colors of 
the flowers. 

Oh, there in the flowers, let us read tonight 
the story of our life. (Taking the flowers in 
his hands.) No need for me to speak to you 
tonight if you would but take up this bunch 
of sweet flowers, and out of their soft, velvety 
petaled hearts, read the lesson that God would 
teach you. See, friends, (holding up the flow- 
er) this little flower. How beautifully God 
made it! How wondrously fashioned! How 
artistically colored! How exquisitely per- 
fumed ! And, after all, what is it ? A .handful 
of earth touched by the finger of the Eternal 
God. A few weeks ago a gardener went forth 
to sow his seed — sow them in the cold, dark 
and noisome earth — and the seed fell from the 
hand of the gardener on a cold, dark sod, to 
lie shivering — shivering in the cold earth— 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

shivering until one day — one glorious day — 
when the golden sunlight of God went up in 
the zenith of the heavens and threw out His 
jewelled arms in benediction o'er the world, 
and this little flower seed, shivering in the 
ground, felt the warmth of life thrilling it 
through and through, felt the finger of God 
touch it, felt the story of life unfold. It start- 
ed and it grew, it burst and bloomed, and now 
tonight it is sending up to God a perfumed 
prayer of praise and thanksgiving. But what 
intelligent man can look down on these beau- 
tiful flowers and not think of the flowers that 
will never bloom? How many other seeds 
were sown by the hand of the gardener that 
fell down into the lowly places. They lie un- 
der the shadows ; they never caught the golden 
sunlight of God when it ascended into the ze- 
nith of the heavens ; the golden finger of 
God never touched them; the warmth of light 
never thrilled them; the mystery of life was 
never known, and there they lie, there they 
moulded, and there they rotted — all earth and 
earthly. 

Friends, is not that the story of your life 
and mine ? I am here to unravel no great won- 
der, to disclose no great scientific principle — 
no deep, intricate reason. I am here to talk 
to you like a father, to tell you that this 
world — this beautiful world of ours — is God's 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

flower garden. Every day — aye! every hour 
of the day — God sends forth His gardeners 
into the world, and they sow the flower seeds 
of God's eternal kingdom^mmortal seeds — 
the souls of men — your soul and mine — and 
they fall from the hands of angels, like the 
flower seeds in the early spring fall upon a 
cold and a dark and noisome earth, and lie 
shivering in a world of sin — shivering until 
one day — that day that comes into every Chris- 
tian life — one day when the glorious sunlight 
of God's divine truths of Christianity goes up 
into the zenith of our lives. One day the 
mystery of life is disclosed, one day the story 
of love is told, and our minds stir and our souls ' 
yearn and our hearts swell and our lips send 
up to God a prayer of praise and thanksgiving. 
That is, some of us do. But how many 
oh, how many, of these immortal souls of men 
are like the flowers that never bloom? They 
have fallen down into the lowly places of life, 
they are lying under the shadows of temptation. 
They never caught the golden sunlight of the 
divine truths of Christianity. The mystery 
of life was never disclosed; the story of love 
was never told them. There they lie ; down in 
the valleys of sin! And friends, unless some 
mind, more skilled in the mysteries of God, 
goes down into the valleys of sin and leads 
them up onto the mountain of God's righteous- 

8 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

ness ; unless some hand, more skilled in the 
mystery of life and death, draws them forth 
from under the shadows of temptation, there 
they will lie, there they will mould, there they 
will rot, like the flowers that never bloom — 
all earth and earthly. Friends, it's for these 
that I come to you tonight, to take you by the 
hand, to talk to you like a father, to walk with 
you through the pathways and byways of life, 
and strive to show you God's sweetest lesson 
of love. 

Friends, were I to speak the heart of God 
I would speak it in a single word — 'tis LOVE ! 
Were I to take the great Scriptures and turn 
them over page by page, and sum up the 
whole work into a single sentence, there would 
be only one word — LOVE! Were I to tell 
you the spirit of the Christ again, I know only 
one word — eternal, everlasting, unending 
LOVE! Yes, friends, that is the mystery of 
life and death : God is Love. And in the realms 
of God all is love. Love rules supreme, re- 
generates, elevates, consecrates all that en- 
ters into the benign circle of God's divine 
pleasure. Yes, God is Love, and it is only in 
the manifestation of that love that we are able 
to know aught of inner excellence or wondrous 
perfection of the Deity. 

When throughout the unending and unopen- 
ing cycles of the vast and vapory unknown. 



!• 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

God, wrapped in the arms of His own Om- 
nipotence, viewed with divine complacency, is 
only limitless perfections, by the infinite act of 
an infinite intellect, was begotten in the heart 
of the Deity His own divine Son, co-existing, 
co-eternal, co-equal with the Divine Father. 
And as in the Son the Father beholds His 
own Divine perfections, and in the Father the 
Son beholds His own Divine prototype, from 
both proceed the Divine Spirit — ^the spirit of 
God, the spirit of LOVE, the completion of 
the August and Holy Trinity, bound in love 
divine. Hence it is that throughout the un- 
reckoned ages of eternity there burst on the 
heart of God that Trinity of Love, first mani- 
fested through the Son, now seeking through 
that Son to externate Himself in the living act 
of creation. So by the love of God Divine 
came forth from naught the myriads of angels 
that surround the great white throne of the 
Deity. So by that love of God Divine for 
these same angels reared up the vaulted arches, 
the jeweled-decked domes of the heavenly 
court. So by that love of God Divine came 
forth from naught seraphic fires, principali- 
ties, thrones, dominations and powers, born in 
love, by love confirmed, with love united, 
and then, when at last the veil of night was 
drawn across the boundless surges of eternity, 
and from a pregnant chaos time was born, by 

10 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

one mere fiat of His mighty will, urged on by 
His love, the co-eternal Son, from formless 
night the light came forth, and all the glories 
of the world were done. Then from the roar- 
ing billowy deep, up rolled the islands green, 
and the earth brought forth her thanks and 
fruits, her trees and flowers, birds flitted from 
tree to tree, within the open sea fleet fishes 
glided, all nature blended in harmony most 
sweet, and sang a song of praise in measured 
beats of love unto her God, and God declared 
it all was well. 

But still, because of that love that burnt 
within the heart of God, He wished to see that 
in this world of ours a knowing mind, a think- 
ing intellect, who seeing all the wonders of na- 
ture, might voice in intelligent language the 
praise and the honor that was due to God. 
Then spake the Lord unto the Lord : ''Let us 
make man,'' said He, ''to our own image and 
likeness.'' 

Friends, do you mark the love of God? Like 
to Himself He would make man perfect. Then 
out of the earth God formed the man, out of 
the clay He fashioned him, for though man 
was to be the king of the earth, he was to 
be himself the thing that was earthly. Though 
he was to be the perfection of nature, he was 
to be a child of that nature. And when that 
perfect form was made, God, in His love, 

11 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

breathed into that perfect form a liv- 
ing soul — the image of the great Crea- 
tor — and when that perfect creature stood 
there before Him, God loved him so He 
could not leave him here forever, and so He 
gave him a promise that one day He would 
unite him to Himself. He raised man from 
the natural to the supernatural plane, and then 
it is as the Scripture says : "God cried out, 'be- 
hold, Adam has become like one of us.' " 

Yes, like to Himself God made man perfect. 
Perfect in himself, m.an held a soul untram- 
meled by the flesh, because the flesh was then a 
body unstained by sin. Now mark the beau- 
tiful story of love upon that favored creature. 
God in love, lavished every care. Never since 
have the angels of God looked down on trees 
so green, on pools so limpid clear. There were 
pebbles of opal, onyx and emerald green ; there 
were ferns and fruits and flowers; there was 
music in the air, perfume in the breezes, colors 
in the grass; joy and gladness and love and 
harmony everywhere, and still amidst that all, 
man has sinned. Aye ! Stood up 'twixt heaven 
and earth and hurled back in the face' of the 
great Creator His pledge of love and immor- 
tality. And in that instant this world became 
a desert, there gathered dark clouds in the 
heavens, the thunders roared and lightning 
flashed the heavens' curse upon the earth. On 

12 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

the sea came a hurricane blast, upon the land 
the earthquakes crashed. There was blight 
in the air, there was blast upon the flowers, for 
sin had entered our beautiful world. God's 
beautiful world was lost. Beasts that before 
were tame and full of play, now put forth their 
claws to tear and their tongues to sting. Birds 
whet their beaks for prey. Upon the sweetest 
land, upon the fairest home this world could 
ever know, our parents turned their backs, 
cast forth upon the pathway of sorrow, the 
broken hearted scions of a ruined race. 

Now after this what did God owe man? 
Only wrath. When God had created man to 
His own image and likeness, placed him in 
that garden of love, showered down upon him 
every favor and every blessing the nature of 
man could wish for or desire ; when the whole 
world, aye, the myriads of worlds of 
the great cosmos were whirling on through 
space, each in its own orbit, obedient 
to the will of God; when the mighty cos- 
mos, with its myriads of worlds was like a 
mighty orchestra playing a symphony of praise 
to the eternal God, and man stood up and 
hurled the one discordant note into that sym- 
phony of praise, what did God owe him? Only 
wrath. And still, because of that love that 
burned within the heart of God, He gave to 
sinning man a saving hope, a promised Re- 

13 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

deemen And so our first parents went forth 
from the closed gate of that garden of love, 
to which is now added the yearning of hope 
that one day they will be re-united with that 
perfect love in heaven above. 

Then stood the world in desolation. For 
four thousand vears men waited for the hour 
of their deliverance. For four thousand years 
the world groaned under the burden of the 
Creator's wrath. For four thousand years 
the wailing prayers of a faithful few arose in 
incensed clouds around the throne of Grod, 
and then — then in the twilight of Jewish great- 
ness, in the setting glory of a degenerate peo- 
ple, the pledge of God was fulfilled : the Mes- 
siah came. Christ Jesus, the Son of God, came 
down to save His perishing people. Yes, God 
loved you so, and God loved me so that He 
gave His only begotten Son that whosoever 
believeth in Him may not perish, but may have 
life everlasting. Miserable and lowly and de- 
spised, the Jesus came. And why? In order 
that every man, woman and child, however de- 
spised, or however much an outcast from the 
world, might seek and might find Him. To 
show His love for you and me, Jesus left 
His throne in Heaven to lie a beggar in a 
manger. To show His love for you and me, 
He cast aside the regal robes of His Divinity 
and donned the rags of our mortality. 

14 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

To show His love for you and me, He 
annihilated Himself, becoming* even as a 
slave. He, the glory of God, and the wisdom 
of God. And on that Christmas night so long 
ago, when Heaven came down to earth, and 
earth seemed raised to Heaven, Mary brought 
forth her only Son, wrapped Him in swaddling 
clothes and laid Him in a manger. And why ? 
Because there was no room for Him in the inn. 

For four thousand years the world had been 
running wild, and man, running wild with the 
world, was seeking his happiness in the things 
of earth, and on that night when God would 
stoop down there from on high and awaken 
the slumbering soul of man and raise him up 
to the dignity of an intelligent being and lead 
him on to the culture and the refinement and 
the civilization of Christianity, God had 
stooped unto His own, and His own received 
Him not. The inns were full of the mighty 
ones, full of titled and nobility and culture and 
riches and gold and silver and silks and laces 
and the riches of Eastern embroidery, and 
there was no room for God — and He went out, 
out onto the hillsides, out to the lowliest of 
God's people. 

You remember the story. There were shep- 
herds watching their flocks by night, and lo, 
as they watched, an angel of God stood by 
them, and the glory of God shone round 

15 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

about them, and they feared with a great fear. 
Just like you and I, standing tonight on the 
culture and refinement and eminence of the 
twentieth century, when a messenger comes 
from God to awaken our startled souls and lead 
us on to higher ideals, nobler ambitions and 
grander living, and the glory of God shines 
round about us, striving to pierce down into 
our souls, you stand there trembling. You are 
afraid ! You are afraid to listen to the voice that 
is leading you on to higher ideals, nobler am- 
bitions and grander living. You are afraid 
to throw open your hearts and let the glory 
of God shine in. And why? Because you 
know if you listen to that voice that is lead- 
ing you on to grander and nobler ideals and 
broader striving — if you open your heart and 
let the glory of God shine in — it means break- 
ing away from the old life and the old com- 
panions ; it means tearing the sin and the 
pain and the temptation out of your soul; it 
means sacrificing something of your earthly 
goods for the benefit of your fellow man and 
the glory of God. And you are afraid ! You 
are afraid ! But, oh, friends, when God is 
leading you on to higher things, and you stand 
there trembling, remember the words of the 
angels that night: "Fear not, for there is 
born to you in the city of David a Savior, 
who is Christ Jesus the Lord.'' A Savior that 

16 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

will come down into your life and my life and 
take the sin and the shame and the pain and 
the temptation out of your soul and mine. A 
Savior that will come down into your every- 
day life and bear again the crosses and the 
burdens upon His mangled shoulders. A Sa- 
vior that stands in the opening years of the 
twentieth century as in the years gone by, with 
His arms outstretched to the world, crying: 
''Come, come unto Me, all ye who labor and 
are heavily laden, and I will refresh you." Oh, 
when once that fundamental idea of Christian- 
ity sinks down into your soul ; when once you 
realize, however narrow the way, however 
dark the path, however terrific the battle, when 
Jesus is leading on 'tis all blithesome and gay. 
Thus with you and with me as with the shep- 
herds on that night: "Immediately there was 
with them a multitude of the heavenly choir, 
praising God and singing, 'Glory to God in the 
highest, and on earth peace — peace to men 
and good will.' " That was the anthem the 
angels sang; that was God's pledge to men — 
"Peace." 

Have you ever thought of it? For two 
thousand years that prayer of praise and of 
peace has rolled forth from the Heavenly 
choirs before the throne of God, and has echo- 
ed on through the universe. Every day, aye! 
every hour of the day, that prayer of praise 

17 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

and of peace rolls up before the throne of 
God, and still we know no peace. 

True, in one Christian home the angels of 
God have sown the seed of peace, destined to 
bloom into immortal flowers that one day will 
be twined around the great white throne of 
the Deity. But in another home, veiling their 
faces, they have fled. And why? If God has 
given us His only begotten Son as a testimony 
of His love and has sealed that gift with an an- 
them of peace, why is the world at war ? Why 
are nations ever contending one with another, 
staining God's beautiful earth red with the 
crimson blood of God's own people? Why 
cannot Christian neighbors live in harmony 
and love, striving to bear the burdens of one 
another, and make of God's beautiful world 
what He intended it — a happy home for the 
children of His love — instead of forever con- 
tending and striving, with their hate and their 
malice and their greed and their lust ? Why do 
sons rise up against fathers and fathers 
against sons ? The ties of blood are rent asun- 
der, homes are broken up, hearthstones are 
cold and broken hearts wander desolately 
through the land. Why? Why, because men 
will not learn the lesson of love. 

Why is the world unhappy tonight? Why 
are there ruined lives and wrecked homes and 
broken hearts and miserable, weak, sinful men 

18 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

and women groveling in the mires of degra- 
dation? Did God make the world so? God 
made the world all sunlight and flowers, with 
the love-songs of the birds and the sighing of 
the breezes and the rippling of the silvery 
brooks, and man ! man ! man ! with his falter- 
ing hand, has given over that masterpiece of 
God, and has made it a meaningless daub — a 
valley of sighs and tears and groans and 
ruined homes and broken hearts. Why is the 
world unhappy tonight? Because you men and 
women seek for happiness where pain lies like 
a serpent in wait to sting. Why are there 
wrecked lives and broken hearts and weak 
men and women crying out to God to take 
back the gift of life? Because you men and 
women insist on drinking of the chalice of the 
world — the chalice of greed, of avarice, of 
lust and strife; a chalice resplendent in gold, 
but alas, dregged with a poison that saps away 
life's vital spark, which is content. Why is 
the world unhappy? Because men will not 
learn the one lesson that the Eternal God has 
been striving to teach to the human heart for 
six thousand years. 

Friends, have you followed me ? 

In love was the Son born in the bosom of 
the Father; in love did He come to earth — 
love of you and love of me. In love did He 
send forth His glorious Christian Church into 

19 



\ 

\ 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

the world to regenerate mankind, socially and 
physically as well as spiritually; to raise men 
up to the dignity of intelligent sons of God ; to 
lead mankind on to the culture and the refine- 
ment and humanity of today; to give to you 
and to me the happy homes, the pure women 
and upright men, the moral code — everything 
that makes your life worth living. And what 
power did Jesus give that church when He sent 
forth twelve ignorant men to regenerate the 
world? No standing armies at their backs to 
fight the battles of civilization; no sword of 
oppression in their hands. One mighty power 
Jesus gave them, one wondrous lesson : ^'Teach 
them/' said the Christ, "to love one another. 
Love God, and love thy neighbor as thyself." 
With that little lesson of love, twelve ignorant 
men went forth to build up a world anew. 

Rome, the mistress of the world, pagan 
Rome, the place that put her strength in the 
power of her sword and her mighty armies; 
Rome, demanding tribute of every civilized 
people, how she laughed at the Spouse of 
Christ — the early Christian Church — that came 
with her lesson of 'love and forgive !' And so, 
away, away from the imperial gates of Rome 
the Church of Christ was driven like a mendi- 
cant and a slave. 

The Greeks, with their splendid literature 
and their false philosophy, looked down with 

20 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

a supercilious sneer and laughed in the faces 
of the messengers of Christ who came with 
their philosophy of ''love and forgive and 
forget/' — and so for three hundred years that 
Church of Christ was an outcast. For three 
hundred years the seed of love was sown. Not 
in the minds of the cultured few ; not in the 
schools of the learned; not in the glittering 
palaces and dome-decked temples, but out to 
the slaves and the renegades of the cities. 
Out under the vaulted dome of God's great 
heavens^ out among the graves and the cata- 
combs of Rome, there were sung the first 
hymns, there were murmured the first pray- 
ers, there were offered the first sacrifices of the 
Christian Qiurch. For three hundred years 
that Church of Christ, with her philosophy 
of love, was a wanderer. For three hundred 
years there were tears in her mother's eyes ; 
there were prayers on her mother's lips ; there 
was blood on her mother's hands — the blood of 
the innocent, the blood of the poor. 

Then at last came her hour of triumph. In 
the dawning years of the fourth century, when 
in spite of the arrogance and pride of Rome, 
in spite of the subtle and false philosophy, the 
imperial eagle of Rome bowed down to the 
Cross, and Jesus Christ, with His lesson of 
love, was at last victorious. 

Take up your histories now, and look back 

31 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

through the vista of ages and see the hand 
of God framing the destiny of Christianity. 
Along in the fourth century and into the fifth, 
down from the North came the barbarians, 
sweeping Hke a tidal wave over Europe. On 
they came, hundreds and thousands, nation af- 
ter nation ; men without any history, men with- 
out any known language, men without one 
idea of the humane. On they came in resist- 
less numbers, like mighty billows sweeping 
over Europe, and Rome, Rome, who had re- 
lied upon her standing armies ; Rome, who 
put her faith in the power of the sword ; Rome 
went down with a crash before the inroad of 
the barbarians, burying the whole civilized 
world in the debris of the ruins. Still and 
still they came on — these barbarians. On 
they came, the Goths and the Visigoths, the 
Huns and the Vandals, in resistless numbers. 
Every nation was rent asunder ; every political 
institution was undermined; every power was 
subjugated; every representative of civilization 
was ruined and buried. All save and except 
one. There was one institution made by the 
power of God and compacted by the hand of 
Jesus Christ. That institution was the glor- 
ious Christian Church. She stood when every- 
thing else went down to ruin and destruction. 
She remained when every other power was 
laid in waste. She received the barbarians as 

22 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

they came down from the North, hundreds 
and thousands. She received nation after na- 
tion, with no standing armies at her back to 
fight the battles of civihzation, no sword of 
oppression in her hand. She received them, 
one after another, into a mother's bosom. 
She taught them the lesson of Qiristianity. 
She told them the meaning of true manhood. 
She showed them the highest ideal of man 
was not to tear down and ruin and destroy, 
but to rear up glorious monuments that might 
stand forever as living testimonies of the God- 
like mind the Creator had given to man. She 
whispered to these savage hordes the story 
of love, and they stood amazed and in wonder. 
Love ! — they could not understand its meaning. 
Forgive ! — there was no such word in their 
barbaric tongue. Forget ! — the heathen mind 
never forgets. And yet, the very novelty of 
the doctrine held them entranced, and they 
stood in open-mouthed wonder, listening to 
that novel story of love. And as they listened, 
they came to understand, and understanding, 
they learned to love, and loving, they sought 
to frame their lives upon the model of THAT 
MIGHTY LOVE. 

Look back through these ages of history and 
in all the stories of the lives of men you will 
fine no sweeter page than the story of that 
Church of Christ in the ages called dark, per- 

23 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

fectly or imperfectly, as you will, fulfilling 
her grand destiny of love, weaving the golden 
thread of charity into the lives and the laws of 
nations, founding a new civilization on the 
mighty principle of the fatherhood of God 
and the brotherhood of man. 

So, as early as the fifth century, the Church 
of Christ was standing alone — alone on the 
ruins and the debris of the world that had 
passed away forever. She did not shrink from 
the task that lay before her. Girding herself 
for that mighty task, alone and unaided, with 
neither arm nor sword, she began the regener- 
ation of humanity — ^the building up of a new 
civilization — to give to the world the upright 
men, the pure women, the happy homes, the 
moral codes, the hum.an society — everything 
that makes your life worth living today. 

When all Europe was a battlefield, flowing 
with blood; when every man was obliged to 
be a soldier and buckle on his armor to de- 
fend his home and his family and his native 
sod ; when every boy must grasp a sword and 
take his place in the armies of his country, 
the only men of culture in Europe, the only 
representatives of civilization, were the rep- 
resentatives of that Church of Christ: the 
priests and monks of these early ages. They 
had gone into their monastic homes with the 
two-fold principle of Christianity engraven 

24 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

upon their hearts : the love of God and the 
love of their fellowman for God's sake. When 
all the land was red with human blood and 
men were wrestling in the throes of death, 
when like the billowy waves of the ocean 
mighty armies surged to and fro across the 
continent of Europe, these representatives of 
the Church of Christ, for the love of God, 
kept alive the light of faith in the hearts of 
the Christians. They sowed the seed of love 
in the minds of the barbarians, and in these 
dark hours prayed for a brighter day, and in 
the depths of their monastic cells copied over, 
letter by letter, the sacred Scriptures, multiply- 
ing copies of the sacred text to hand down to 
a civilization, which they knew, by the prom- 
ises of Christ, was yet to come out of that 
chaos and gloom. For love of man they left 
the safe retreat of their monastic homes and 
went out into that maelstrom of war and 
blood, gathering together all they could lay 
hai.ds on of Roman art and Grecian culture, 
and carried it back with them into the safe re- 
treats of their churches and their monas- 
teries, and there in the depths of these same 
monastic cells copied over the works of Virgil 
and of Horace, and thus preserved the classical 
literature of the past, that they might hand it 
dov^n to a civilization which would forget their 

25 



THE POWER OF LOVE 



very no.mes and the good they had done to 
humanity. 

Ages rolled on, and what a sight to see! 
Barbaric hordes, who had come down from the 
North without one idea of the humane, throw- 
ing away their swords to take up the plough 
and learn the homely occupation of a civilized 
life. Around the churches and the monasteries, 
reared up in the name of Christ, there was the 
first land tilled in the new civilization of Eu- 
rope; there the first schools were opened; 
there the seed of the new civilization was 
sown, which was destined to spread to the re- 
motest corners of the earth. What a lesson 
of love to view the Church in these days of 
gradual progress, carrying out her Divine mis- 
sion of love, weaving the golden thread of 
charitv into the fabric of nations. 

m' 

And while she preserved the faith of Christ 
that would save men's souls, she was ever 
mindful of man's material necessities. With 
her Divine wisdom she threw a mantle of re- 
ligion over the ruins of ancient Rome, that 
she might protect them from the barbarism of 
the people. On the walls of the Pantheon she 
placed the twelve statues of the apostles, that 
the stamp of religion might make these ruins 
sacred in the eyes of the Vandals. On the top 
of the pillar of Trojan was placed the statue 
of St. Peter, that it might be safe from the 

26 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

ravages of the barbarians. It was a monk 
of that early Church that attended the laurel 
that grew upon the grave of Virgil and of 
Horace. 

In all the pages of history we see this free- 
ing power of love. Is there a page in history 
that you love to read? The story of a great 
man or a noble woman? That reading, you 
would wish to give your children, that they, 
reading it, might be the better? And why do 
you love that page in history? Why is the 
name of that man or woman handed down 
from age to age? Is it because their lives are 
all glory? Is it because they wrung from 
the world a mighty share of the world's spoils ? 
Is it not rather because they have sacrificed 
everything that men hold dear in order that 
you and I might be free and gloriously inde- 
pendent at the price of another man's love? 
Is it not well, then, that I come to you tonight 
to tell you in my own way that old, old story 
of love — as old as God's world? Is it not, af- 
ter all, the only story of life worth telling? 

When the young man went to the Master, 
and standing before Him, asked the mystery 
of love; when he asked: "Master, which is 
the greatest commandment of the law?" do 
you remember Jesus preached no long sermon 
— there was no deep, intricate reasoning, no 
abstract philosophy. In a single sentence Je- 

27 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

sus tells him the mystery of happiness : "The 
first and greatest commandment of the law is 
this : that you love the Lord, thy God, with thy 
whole heart and thy whole soul and thy whole 
strength." And the second is like unto this: 
"Love thy neighbor as thyself." In this is the 
completion of the law. Indeed, well did the 
early Christian understand this when St. Paul, 
that apostle par excellence, that man who 
seemed called from the great white throne of 
God to lead the Gentiles on to the culture and 
the refinement and the civilization and the 
Christianity of today, when he would, as it 
were, throw out the golden lifeline to guide 
the Corinthians safely through the breakers of 
life, o'er the shoals of time, onto the shores of 
eternity, again there is no sermon, again there 
is no deep philosophy. In a single sentence 
he tells them: "Spake I with the tongue of 
an angel, had I faith that would move moun- 
tains, and I have not charity, 'tis all vain and 
meaningless." 

Is it not well then, that I come to you to tell 
you again the story of love, to awaken your 
startled souls, to say to you that the love of 
}Our fellowmen for God's sake is the founda- 
tion stone of Christianity? Aye, more, that 
the helping of your fellowmen for God's sake 
—the helping of a fellow creature is the key- 
stone of all rehgion. For, after all, what is 

28 ' 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

religion? Is it long prayers and loud sung 
hymns, and sighs and formulas and exterior 
expression? Whatever all this may play in 
your scheme of religion, religion is something 
infinitely grander. True religion is the Spirit 
of God, like the golden sunlight trembHng o'er 
the land, giving life and vitality to all creation. 
True religion is that spirit of God in life, tear- 
ing down the mighty mountains of iniquity 
and filling the plains of vice, and in spite of 
the greed and the avarice and the lust and 
the perfidy of men, making the whole world 
scintillate in the glory of God. True religion 
is that golden cord of justice that binds the 
human soul forever to the great white throne 
of Deity. True religion is the sum total of 
relation to God. It is the spirit of God deep 
down in the human soul, manifesting itself in 
our actions toward God and toward our fel- 
lowman. 

Do you doubt this? Analyze your religion. 
I care not what your denomination may be, 
what your creed or your formula — analyze it 
down to its fundamental principle, and your 
religion is God — that inborn religious sense 
of your relation to and your dependence upon 
God. Religion — true religion — then is the 
sum total of man's relation to God and its 
consequent obligations. 

And what do you know of God? Were it 

29 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

not for the lessons of love written by the hand 
of God all o'er the world of nature, were it 
not for these inspired messages handed by- 
love, what would you know of the inner excel- 
lence or the wonderful perfections of the De- 
ity ? Can you not see the debt that the human 
race owes to God is the debt of love, the debt 
that you and I and every man owes is a debt 
of love? Are you honest men, are you up- 
right women? Then pay back to the Eternal 
God the debt you owe. Pay Him back in the 
coin in which the debt was contracted — the 
coin of love. 

And how shall we, creatures of the finite, 
reach to and grasp the garments of Divinity, 
and pay back our debt of love? God has told 
you how. Pay it back to the sons and daugh- 
ters of the Mighty Father. Pay it back to 
the poor and the miserable and the sinful and 
the weak and the wayward creatures in this 
world. Pay it back to the heirs of Christ, the 
little naked children, shivering in the winter- 
time. Is this asking too much? Is it asking 
too much that you make the helping of- your 
fellowmen the grand motive of your life? 

After all, what are you? If I were to ask 
you, one by one, would you not stand up to- 
night before heaven and earth, and cry out: 
"I am a Christian!" Are you? Are you a 
Christian? Have you ever stopped in your 

30 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

religious fervor and your loud sung hymns 
and your sighs long enough to ask yourself: 
*'What does it mean?'' when you and I stand 
on the mountain of culture and education of 
the twentieth century, and cry out: "I am a 
Christian!" Christian! It means Christus, 
another Christ. Are you a Christian? Are 
you another Christ? Then in God's name go 
home tonight, take up the Testament and 
read it over, letter for letter and line for line 
until you have read the life of Christ. Are 
you a Christian? Read it o'er and o'er and o'er 
until you can stand before the world and say : 
*1 know it — I know the life of Christ." Are 
you a Christian? When you have read it, when 
you can stand before the world and say: "I 
know it," then go out into a world of sin 
and shame, of misery and broken hearts, of 
weak and sinful men, and live, live that life 
of Christ! 

Ah, friends, when we look around the world, 
and use that God-like intellect that the Crea- 
tor has given us, it is easy for any intelligent 
man to understand the part he is to play in 
the great scheme of Christianity's regeneration 
of the world. What we need in the opening 
years of the twentieth century is not more 
grand churches reared up in the name of 
Christ, not more eloquent preachers to go forth 
and repeat over and over the story of the 

31 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

Christ, but we need more men and women 
to live the life of Christ in a world of sin. 
When you look around you and see the ruined 
homes and the broken hearts and the wrecked 
lives and the sin-debased humanity, and the 
poor, weak, miserable men and women, 
dragged on in the vortex of vice, your own 
intelligence will tell you what we need is sym- 
pathy, is charity, is love — more of the Christ- 
like spirit in everyday life. When I speak of 
charity and love and the Christ-life, I do not 
mean your religion at arm's length — your 
charity and sighs and groans and tears. No! 
I mean hand-in-hand fellowship; I mean that 
kind of Christianity, that kind of love, that 
kind of brotherhood that will clothe the little 
naked children that are shivering in the win- 
ter's cold. I mean that kind of charity that 
will get food for the hungry, medicine for the 
sick, clothing for the naked. I mean that kind 
of religion that will find a job for the poor man 
who has a big family to support. But more 
than all that, for, after all, that is only the 
human part, I mean that kind of religion that 
can go down into the gutter, into the mire 
and the dirt of the world, and raise up the 
poor sinner that is bound in the slavery of 
hell,4 the poor creature that is chained 
down in the strength of his own pas- 
sions. Perhaps it is a young girl, and the 

32 




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THE POWER OF LOVE 

breath of suspicion has rolled from mouth to 
mouth, and you have turned your face away 
from her, and you have closed your doors in 
her face, you have driven her out of your 
churches, and the arms of hell w^ere opened 
wide ready to receive her. Perhaps it is a 
drunkard, and he has reeled through the streets 
of your city, and he has fallen helpless in the 
gutter and lies a brute at your doorway. His 
coat is torn and ragged and dirty, his face is 
begrimed with the slime of the gutter, his 
eyes are bleared and bloated ; he looks, indeed, 
more like a beast than a man^ but will you pass 
him by? Would Jesus leave him there in the 
gutter? Are you a Christian? Raise him 
up! Do you not know that underneath that 
ragged coat, behind that bloated face, there is 
a soul? — a soul in the image and the likeness 
of the Eternal God! — a soul that Jesus so 
loved that He hung for three mortal hours upon 
the cross, and even tonight He is standing be- 
fore the throne of the Eternal Father, praying : 
* 'Father, that I may not lose even one of these, 
My little ones !'' Raise him up for Christ's 
sake, and one day you may be glad to have 
even the soul of a drunkard to hold up before 
your own trembling heart and the eyes of the 
Eternal God. 

Oh, friends, how different this world would 
be if you and I would so model our lives. If 

33 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

every man that says he is a Christian would 
bring that spirit of Christ into his everyday 
life! But you will ask me, what is the spirit 
of Christ? Friends, I dare not answer. Was 
power ever given to the human mind to en- 
compass the spirit of Christ? Was power 
ever given to the human tongue to frame that 
spirit in language? How many times, when 
young men, yearning for a better life, come to 
me, asking this question: what is the spirit 
of Christ? when old men, trembling on the 
grave, seek to unfold the mystery; when ma- 
trons and maids seek my guidance, I stand and 
tremble and wonder if I dare answer. 

What is the spirit of Christ? 

Friends, though I may not put that spirit 
in words, God knows sometimes I feel it. 
Sometimes, when I am alone in that wild 
northwestern country, driving along the coun- 
try roads, in the days of the early fall, when 
the land is rich with the harvest^ and a storm 
has swept across the country, and the sky is 
dark with clouds, and the air seems thick with 
moisture, and the rains drench the land, the 
trees and the shrubbery seem weeping in the 
uncertain light, and the grain has bent down 
its heads, heavy under the storm, and the 
world seems weeping — the land is bowed in 
sorrow — have you ever noticed: a rift comes 
in the cloud, and the golden finger of God 

34 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

steals through, and the arm of light sweeps 
over the land and the golden sun shines and 
trembles across the field? And see the world 
is changed ! The trees are no longer weeping, 
but glisten with colorless jewels; the shrub- 
bery is ablaze with liquid diamonds ; the golden 
grain raises its head, waving gently in the 
breeze; the sunlight waves in great billows 
across the field — no longer a land of sorrow, 
but a sea of gold, scintillating under the glor- 
ious sun of dav. 

Friends, that is the spirit of Christ. Like 
the golden sunlight, He went from city to city 
in Judea, bringing life and joy and light into 
every heart. They brought forth the lame and 
the maimed and the blind and the miserable, 
that the shadow of Jesus might fall upon 
them, that they might be freed from their ills, 
that they might look once into the eyes of 
Christ, and never again know pain nor sor- 
row. Ah, friends, there is the model of a 
truly Christian life: to bring sunshine into 
the dark spots of the earth, to bring joy into 
broken hearts^ to give hope to the heart that 
despaireth, to reach out a helping hand to 
the w^eary and the weak stumbling along the 
path of Hfe. 

Would you be a Christian? Would you be 
another Christ? Friends, there is a picture 
in the life of Jesus that I would every Chris- 

35 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

tian soul had engraven upon his heart. It is 
a beautiful sunny day in the city of Judea, 
early in the morning. The grey dawn is hang- 
ing like a pall over the world. The whole city 
ahum and abustle, buzzing like a great bee- 
hive, making its preparation for the day, be- 
fore the burning heat of the Eastern sun. All 
the little shops are open. Already the mer- 
chants' goods are spread out even into the 
roadway. Already the crowds are congregat- 
ing on the corner. Already the merchants 
run hither and thither. Already the children 
peek their heads over the stone balustrades of 
the housetops. But, lo, across the country a 
courier approaches ! A messenger brings the 
glad tidings that Jesus, the great Prophet, is 
coming to town, and the hum and the bustle 
cease, and the preparations stop in the midst 
of their striving, and the stores are closed up, 
and the goods are put away, and the mer- 
chants congregate on the corners, and the wo- 
men bear the news from house to house, and 
the crowd surges into the street. It is to be 
a holiday. Jesus is coming to town!' And 
as the news spreads from mouth to mouth, and 
as the streets are filling with curious and ex- 
pectant people, there stands in the heart of that 
city, in the early dawn, a woman of the street 
— a creature of sin — the despised Magdala. 
There she stands, leaning against the stone 

36 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

building, and there is a look of hate in her 
eyes and a curling smile of scorn upon her 
lips as she throws back the sneers of the crowd 
who tell her: ^^Go home, go home, Jesus is 
coming!'' And the women draw away their 
garments lest they become unclean, and the 
Magdala laughs in their faces and cries out: 
''What do I care for your Jesus? What do 
I care for your Prophet? I will go home 
and I will put on my finest linen, and I will 
deck myself in jewels, and I will come back 
and laugh in the face of your Jesus, and en- 
trap the Prophet of your GodT' With a 
snatch of song, she dances along the street to 
her own apartments, and entering in bathes 
herself in sweet perfumes, and out from a 
great chest of drawers she takes the finest linen 
and robes her splendid form, and then for hours 
she brushes her beautiful hair until it scintil- 
lates like spun gold in the glory of day. Then 
out of that chCvSt of drawers she takes strand 
upon strand of gold and silver cord and plaits 
them into her matchless hair. The glittering 
jewels are placed upon her forehead — glitter- 
ing with jealousy over her sparkling eyes. 
Upon her fingers are rings without number, 
on her arms bracelets even to the elbows. 
Around that spotless throat are bound rope 
upon rope of pearls, and over all she throws 
the badge of her silken shame, and now for 

37 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

the moment she stands before her little metal 
mirror, and looking down at the beautiful 
image there she arches her eye-brows, she 
paints her cheeks and she crimsons her lips, 
and she laughs back at the beautiful picture, 
and whispers, *'No man born of woman can 
resist me now !'* 

Then with a snatch of a song, she hurries 
back into the midst of the city and places her- 
self upon a corner where she will catch the eyes 
of Jesus as He comes down the street. And 
the people surge forward, and behold! Mary 
must raise herself upon her tiptoes to look over 
the heads of the surging crowd. And there is 
a cry of joy, and the people rush forward. 
For the moment Mary stands alone. Jesus is 
coming down the street. The crowds shout 
and hail Him as the Mighty Prophet, but Je- 
sus seems to hear no sound. A young blind 
man, crouched down on his doorstep, is cry- 
ing out with a broken heart: "J^^us, Son of 
David, have mercy on me!" and Jesus heeds 
him not. The old women run after Him to 
touch the hem of His garment, that they may 
be made clean, and Jesus knows them not. His 
eyes are wandering over the crowd. Hither 
and thither His gaze wanders. He is looking 
for one — the greatest sinner of all in that sin- 
ful city — that He may send her down the high- 
ways of tim.e to teach you and me how to live 

38 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

the life of Christ. See! the crowd rushes 
forward now, and Mary must raise herself on 
her tiptoes to look over the heads of the men, 
and lo, as she strains and stretches, her eyes 
meet the eyes of the Christ. My God! how 
she screams when she sees the eyes of the 
Saviour ! How she cowers down like a whipped 
dog, trembling; how she crawls, like an ani- 
mal, hiding behind the backs of the men till 
she comes to the corner, and there, standing 
erect, her arms clasped upon her bosom, her 
eyes gleam wildly, her bosom heaves, and all 
the time she is crying between her sobs : *'J^" 
sus, I am coming! Jesus, I am coming! Je- 
sus, I am coming!" But all the time she is 
running away. Running madly, wildly, away 
from Jesus, away from the crowd, away from 
the houses and the bustle and the city; out be- 
yond the walls, out into the wild country, and 
there, standing alone, with maddened hands 
she tears the jewels from her beautiful hair 
and casts them far away into the shrubbery. 
The gold and silver cords are torn from her 
plaited locks, and handfuls of hair come with 
them. The rope of pearls is stamped into the 
ground at her feet. The badge of her silken 
shame is rent asunder, and Mary stands al- 
most naked. Her hair is flowing wild in the 
wind. Only the linen garment covers her 
shame. Her arms are thrown out towards the 

39 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

city, and she cries: "J^sus, I am coming! 
Jesus, I am coming !" Now back, like a crazed 
creature, she runs through the town, and the 
crowds pause as she passes, and the men point 
their fingers and say : "See ! see ! see ! Mary is 
mad!" and the boys hurl stones at her, and 
all the time she is crying: "Jesus, where are 
you? Jesus, where are you? Jesus, where 
are you?" But Jesus is gone. 

You know the story. Jesus was to dine that 
day with a Pharisee, and He has gone on down 
the street into the house of the Pharisee. 
And the feast is brought forth, and the table 
is groaning under the viands, and there are 
lots of flowers and music and songs and laugh- 
ter and women in festive attire, and men are 
hurrying to and fro, and all of a sudden they 
are still! A woman of the street is standing 
in the doorway — a creature of sin has pollut- 
ed the house. She does not hear the men as 
they swear at her and call her vile names ; she 
does not see the Jewish women cowering in 
the corners, lest they become unclean ; she sees 
only Jesus, and rushing in, throws herself down 
at the feet of the Master. Those beautiful eyes, 
that have entrapped so many souls in sin, 
rain down tears on the feet of the Savior. That 
matchless hair, that has bound so many hearts 
in the slavery of hell, wipes the feet of the 
Master. 

40 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

Would you be a Christian? Would you be 
another Christ? What did Jesus do? When 
the Pharisees stood over in the corner and 
pointed their fingers and said : ''See, He talks 
to a woman of the street !'' did Jesus say : *'You 
thing, what are you doing here?'' Did Jesus 
say: ''You reprobate^ what have you in com- 
mon with the Son of God?'' Jesus, the Man 
of Purity, stooped down and before them all 
raised the woman to her feet and cried : 
"Mary, many sins have been forgiven thee, 
because thou hast loved much. Go, and sin 
no more!" 

Ah, friends, how the world might change if 
you and I would live that life of Christ ! 

I often wonder, friends, do you ever think 
how many souls might be saved, how many 
broken hearts healed, how many wrecked lives 
restored, if men would learn that spirit of 
Christ. How many, oh, how many young 
men, tonight are inmates of our penitentiaries 
and reformatories, wearing the striped badge 
of degradation, with a stain upon their char- 
acter that no power of man can wipe out. Is 
it because they are worse than you or me ? Is 
it not rather because when the boy made his 
first mistake — when he took that first step 
that leadeth down to perdition — there was not 
one Christian man in all that town with enough 
of the spirit of Christ to take that boy by the 

41 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

hand and show him the way to a better life? 
What did you care for the boy that was go- 
ing to hell? You were busy with your own 
home and your own family and your own am- 
bitions. You were so satisfied with your faith 
in Christ and your professed piety and your 
long prayers. What did you care for the boy 
that was making the mistake that meant his 
ruination ? What did you care for the boy that 
never had a decent home; never heard the 
golden lessons of Christianity; never had a 
father to advise him or to help him ? Perhaps 
you are the very one that, when his fall was 
known, cried out for judgment on him. You 
laid down the law, you uttered the sentence, 
and the crowd howled in unison. And you 
Christian men drove that boy out of respecta- 
bility, and hell was glad to receive him. And 
he might have been saved! — he might have 
been saved ! He, and hundreds of others, 
might today be an honor to the land and a con- 
solation to their families, filling the empty 
seats in your churches, if there had been one 
man with enough of the spirit of Christ to 
take that wild and wayward boy by the hand 
and say : *'See here, John, this is not the way 
to be a man. This is not the way to make a 
success of life." How he would have looked 
up at you with amazement! You, the respec- 
table man of the town, talking to the boy that 

42 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

was an outcast ! One of you men whose name 
he had seen in the papers and had loked upon 
as something of a superior creature. And to 
have that man come to him, and take him by 
the hand and advise him! He would be like 
a baby in your hands. 

How many thousands of women are lost on 
the streets tonight ? Lost to God and to society 
and to the church, because when the girl was 
wayward and wild, as yet no real evil in her 
life, and the breath of scandal was just taint- 
ing her name, there was not a woman in all 
your churches to give that girl the hand of a 
mother — a woman who could do it without 
injury to herself. No! You drove her out 
of your homes, and you shut the doors of your 
churches in her face, and the arms of hell 
were opened wide to receive her and drag her 
down — through the maelstrom of vice that 
is rolling through our land. 

Friends, you think I am talking theory. You 
will say: '^Oh, this is a very beautiful theory, 
a very beautiful doctrine, but it won't work 
out in everyday life.'' Friends, you are wrong. 
I am not talking theory, I am talking life — 
everyday life. I am telling you the power that 
makes it possible for you to live the respectable 
life that you are striving. Do you think it is 
your little influence that is filling your boys with 
a noble ambition, with a desire to be honorable 

43 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

and pure men? Do you think it is yourself 
who is rearing up your pure daughters and 
making them like lilies, clean and spotless ? Do 
you think it is simply your desire that is mak- 
ing the clean hemes and the upright society of 
today? Friends, you are wrong. Were it not 
for the few faithful men and women who are 
living the life of Christ in the world today, 
stemming the tide of vice, your pure homes 
would be an impossibility. Your daughter 
would be tainted with the polluted atmosphere 
that would swell round her; your boy would 
go mad with the lust of the hour. Vice would 
enter the very sanctuary of your homes. 

Would you know the power of love? I 
would to God I could take you with me to- 
night — every one of you — you men and you 
women who think you know the world. I 
wish to God I could show you the power of 
one kind word, with the spirit of Christ be- 
hind it. I would to God I could take you to- 
night into a great penitentiary — into your great 
prisons tonight — along that ill-smelling hall 
with grated cages on either side for men made 
to the image of God. Along that ill-smelling 
hall tonight I would take you with me, and 
the guard would say : *'Do not go over there, 
don't go near that cell; that man is a brute; 
we have him in a strait- jacket most of the 
time ; he will swear and curse and revile you." 

44 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

But, friends, don't mind the guard. That is 
his business. That is the very cell I want to 
take you to. I want to show you the lowliest 
of God's creatures. I want to show you a man 
that has sunk lower than a dog. I want you to 
go up close by that cell where you will be able 
to see that the guard has spoken the truth. 
The man is a brute. The devil is gleaming out 
of his very eyes ; his face has grown a ghastly, 
sickly pallor. Great circles are under his eyes. 
The marks of crime are graven in the lines of 
his forehead. But, ah, friends, do not turn 
away because of that. I want you to wait. I 
want you to wait until the guard has turned his 
back. I want you to wait until the guard has 
gone, and see the devil die out of that man's 
eyes, see that face flush crimson red, and then 
grow whiter, if possible, than it was before. I 
want you to see that beast-man tremble in 
every fibre. I want you to see his stubby, crim- 
inal hands creep out between the bars and clasp 
mine like a child. I want you to see the tears 
roll down that hardened face when that man 
knows he has found one who pities a soul that 
is half in hell — one who knows the devil he 
has fought; one who understands the world 
with which he has battled ; one who knows the 
temptations that assail him every hour. Oh, 
I wish to God you could lay your head against 
that grated door, and between the heart-broken 

45 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

sobs listen to the story that such men never 
tell to any man but a priest. You would un- 
derstand better what I mean by living the 
life of Christ. 

Would you know the power of love? Would 
you know the power of one kind word when 
the spirit of Christ is back of it? Come with 
me into a great city tonight — come with me 
into Chicago. Down on State street and Clark 
street, at half-past eleven or twelve o'clock, 
when the lights are going out and respectable 
people are hurrying to their homes, you will 
see them — the women of the street — in all their 
garbs, coming 'round the corners, dodging into 
doorways. Men swear at them as they pass 
by, and now, for a little while, they come out 
into the light, and the rowdies over at the sa- 
loon door whistle and jeer and call them vile 
names, and again they dodge back into the 
doorways. And now again the woman of the 
town comes out under the great electric light 
on the corner like an animal at bay, looking 
this v/ay and that, and the men curse her as 
they pass by — the very men who have made 
her what she is, curse her tonight — and the 
rowdies whistle and jeer, and a policeman, 
coming along, strikes her with his club and 
says : "Damn you, go on !" A sister of Christ 
in a city of churches ! Like a dog they have 
driven her across the crossing and down the 

46 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

street. You will say : ''She has sold herself." 
Sold herelf ! My God! It won't hurt you to 
know — God knows it. 

Last .winter when you gathered close by 
your fires and shivered when the wind howled, 
and the thermometer sank down to the de- 
grees below zero, thousands of these women 
walked the streets. Thev had not ten cents 
between themselves and starvation. Sold her- 
self ! Sold herself ! Friends, tonight hundreds 
of these women will walk the streets all night 
long from darkness until dawn, hour after 
hour, walking to save themselves from freez- 
ing to death. 

Well, she has gone on down the street to- 
night. The men have cursed her; the officer 
of the law has driven her on like an animal. 
Is it sin and shame and lust that is in her 
heart? Ah, friends, the purest woman could 
look into that heart tonight and not blush 
for the picture she sees there. The days of her 
sin hath passed and gone. The hour of retri- 
bution is at hand. She is going down the 
street tonight thinking of the days when she 
stood in the church with you and " me and 
prayed the prayer of Jesus : ''Our Father, who 
art in Heaven." And tonight, between her 
clenched teeth, she is asking the words: "I 
wonder if there is a God?'' She sinks back 
into the doorway, and the wind howls, and the 

47 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

rain beats into her face, and the great town 
clock tolls out the hour of twelve. She doesn't 
mind the crowd now. She doesn't hear the 
sneers that are thrown at her. She is dream- 
ing of home. It all comes back — the old home 
and the old friends, and the father and mother, 
the sisters and brothers. God knows she loved 
them in the old days! She is thinking of the 
life — ^the beautiful life — God gave her, and 
oh, what a wreck she has made of it all. She 
can see that old home tonight so plainly. The 
old kitchen, the great fireplace, the teakettle 
singing its endless song. She knows it is past 
midnight, and they have all gone to bed, broth- 
ers and sisters — gone to bed hours ago. And 
now the old father has taken off his shoes and 
placed them there by the kitchen fire, and he, 
too, stumbles off to bed, murmuring a bit of 
an old familiar prayer — and the house is still. 
But, ah friends, that poor deserted creature in 
a great city knows well what you and I un- 
derstand. There is one faithful soul that never 
sleeps when the w^ayward child it astray. Some- 
where in this beautiful land of ours tonight 
the old grey-haired mother sits by the win- 
dow, looking out into the gathering night, and 
when the children laugh and play and tell 
their stories, and mother nods her head, she 
does not even knov/ what they are saying. 
Her thoughts are far away in a great city — far 

48 




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THE POWER OF LOVE 

away in a great city, where her girl went years 
ago, and they have never heard from her since. 
But mother would not speak one word to make 
the home unhappy. And even now, when the 
children have all gone off to bed, mother keeps 
that story locked up in her heart. She would 
not pain that old father. And now mother is 
alone — alone with God. Now she stands for 
the moment and listens to see that they are all 
asleep ! and then, tiptoing gently across 
the kitchen floor, she takes down the old 
kerosene lamp and places it on the kitchen 
table and opens up her old worn Bible and 
reads over and over and over again the story 
of Magdala, until her old heart grows weary, 
and her head has fallen upon her hands. And, 
friends, she is praying to Jesus: "J^^us, send 
me back my girl. I don't care how bad she 
is, I don't care how far she has wandered 
away; but, Jesus, send her back, send her 
back !'' 

Friends, don't you know that God hears that 
mother's prayer? I say to you, God does hear. 
That mother's prayer will cleave the heavens 
and shriek before the throne of God. And 
even now the great God has turned upon His 
great white throne and is bending down and 
listening. He is looking through this audience, 
through your Christian homes, through your 
churches, looking for a woman who dares, for 

49 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

a woman who could, with safety to herself and 
her family — a grand woman like that woman, 
Mrs. Booth — who will go out on the corner to- 
night and meet these creatures, looking up for 
a word from God ; like our little Sisters of the 
Good Shepherd, who will throw open their 
doors tonight and receive these creatures in, 
answering their questioning souls thus : 'There 
is a God. We come to you as representatives 
of that Christ that died for all. We will show 
you the way to a pure life; we will lead you, 
step by step, up that mountain of God's right- 
eousness, like Magdala of old. You stand for- 
given at the feet of Christ." 

Ah, friends, how many more might be saved 
if you would live that life. 

But instead of forming your life on the 
model of your professed belief, you go on with 
your bickering and quarreling and striving, 
with your jealousies and vain ambitions, until 
the intelligent observer must wonder if your 
faith is aught but a snare, and your profession 
more than a lie. How many times in the glory 
of the twentieth century I have asked myself : 
"Is this Christian society, or are we back again 
in the inhumanity and greed of Rome?'* How 
many times I have sat in the midst of Christian 
society, surrounded by cultured men and ele- 
gantly dressed women, and I sat there silent. 
How manv times have cultured women turned 

50 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

to me and said : "Father, why don't you talk?'' 
Talk! My God, how could a Christian talk? 
What is the conversation? Is it something to 
broaden the minds or elevate the hearts or 
inspire the souls of the listening? Is it a plan 
to better the condition of society around you ? 
Is it even a theme that would hold intelligence ? 
How manv times the theme of cultured so- 
ciety brings back to my mind the memory of 
the South ! The great black buzzards, sweep- 
ing like a cloud across the heavens, shutting 
out the sunlight of God; flying on o'er fields 
of sweet scented flowers, on o'er the limpid 
silverv streams, and thev see them not. Till lo, 
in the depths of the forest they come upon a 
festering carcass, and they swoop down upon 
that rotten mass, and gorge themselves upon 
the rottenness of a fellow creature. 

Is not that too often the picture of our 
Christian women of the twentieth century? 
They have before them the carcass of a woman 
weaker than themselves, and the stench of her 
decaying character seems to attract rather than 
repel their careful scrutiny. They would tear 
into tatters what little is left of a sister's char- 
acter. And you Christian men, you have your 
neighbor in a corner, and you will squeeze 
the very heart's blood out of him and coin it 
into your filthy dollar. You want the law, and 
you will have your rights, and you demand 

51 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

justice, and you will 'hold him down to the 
letter of the code. You will? If you and I 
receive justice from God tonight, would you be 
there — would I be here ? 

I remember a little incident in my own life. 
In the town where I was reared we had many 
good Christian families. There was one fami- 
ly noticeable because they were leaders in the 
church, because they were foremost in all pub- 
lic movements, and indeed, as far as their ex- 
terior life went, they were model Christians. 
I remember that family had many good cus- 
toms. Every night when the hour came for re- 
tiring, the father took down the Bible and read 
a chapter from the Sacred Text. Then all to- 
gether, the family, kneeling, asked the bless- 
ing of God upon their home before retiring to 
rest. I remember another good custom of that 
family. Of an evening, when the supper dishes 
were cleared av/ay, instead of each one hurry- 
ing off to his or her amusement, it was the 
custom of that family to gather around the 
table, and one of the boys, or one of the girls, 
would read aloud some good book far their 
instruction or their entertainment. Some- 
times, when the book was put away, one of the 
family would read aloud from the newspaper 
the local news. On the night of which I am 
about to tell you, one of the boys took up the 
daily paper and began to read on down the col- 

52 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

umn of the local news, till he came to a certain 
place in the paper — there had been a scandal 
in the town. One of the young women of so- 
ciety had forgotten the laws of God and man 
and had taken one step down the social grade, 
and it had gotten into print, and as he read on 
he read aloud this incident. Then, putting the 
paper aside, the family began to discuss the 
situation, each one striving to tear into shreds 
what little was left of the girl's character. The 
mother was very bitter. She could recall a 
dozen different incidents in which the girl had 
been bold and brazen and forward, and she 
even said she believed it was a judgment of 
God that she should end just as they found 
her. Each one of the girls had their little dab 
at their fallen sister. The father was most 
bitter of all. When they were all so hard on 
the young creature, one of the family, a girl 
about sixteen or seventeen — she might have 
been eighteen — began to plead for the girl 
and make excuses. 

Turning to her father, she said: ^'Father, 
why are you so hard on her ? Isn't it some ex- 
cuse that she is young? And then, father, per- 
haps she loved him." 

The father turned on her with disgust! 
"What do you know about this? I am sur- 
prised to hear a girl of mine say one word for 
the woman that don't know enough to take 

53 



\ 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

care of herself. I tell you, my girls, when a 
woman goes wrong, no decent woman should 
say a word in her favor; no decent home 
should shelter her. When a woman once goes 
wrong, there is no place left for her in the 
world — no place but the river.'^ 

When he had said this, there was little more 
talk. His words semed to cast a sort of a chill 
over the family, and after a little while the pa- 
per was put away and each one began prepar- 
ing for their bed. Then the father — that very 
man who had said there was no place left in 
the world for the sinner but the river — reached 
up and took down his Bible and read a chapter 
from the Master's word, and then, all together, 
kneeling, they prayed the prayer of Jesus: 
**Our Father, who are in Heaven, * * * h^ 
forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those 
who trespass against us," and they went off to 
their bed feeling themselves good Christians. 

Went off to bed and to sleep — all but one. 
There was one member of that family who 
did not sleep that night. I went to school with 
her when I w^as only a bit of a child, and many 
a time since the story became public property 
I have pictured her to myself when that prayer 
was ended. Springing to her feet like a guilty 
thing, she ran upstairs and into her own room 
and quickly locked the door, lest any of the oth- 
ers should disturb her, and stood like an animal 

54 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

at bay, listening, waiting, watching, until they 
were all quiet in their own rooms, and then, 
half-kneeling and half-sitting, she crouched 
down by the window and looked out into God's 
beautiful starlit sky, repeating over and over 
again between her sobs the words of her father : 
"There is no place left — no place but the 
river!'' Looking up into God's beautiful sky 
and wondering if the judgment of God would 
be as hard as the judgment of man, and when 
they vvcre all asleep in their rooms she sprang 
to her feet, grabbed an old shawl and threw 
it over her head, and carefully unlocking the 
door, silently crept down the stairway and 
along the hall and out the front door and down 
the stoop, and then slinking along in the shad- 
ows of the buildings until she came to the river 
— and there ! standing one instant on the bridge 
between the judgment of God and the judg- 
ment of man, she sprang over the bridge into 
the river. 

I was only a boy then. I saw her body the 
next morning, half buried in the soft slime 
under the shallow water. They had tied it 
with a rope and it was swishing back and 
forth with the incoming tide, waiting for the 
coroner. I saw her father when the news had 
reached him, come like a madman down the 
street — no hat or coat — and, oh! he shrieked 
like a woman when he saw the ghastly, up- 

55 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

turned face ! How he cried aloud like a child 
and sank on his knees and begged and prayed 
God to strike him dead because he had passed 
sentence on his own child. It seemed all right 
last night when he was laying down a cruel 
law for another man's child. It seemed all 
right last night to be narrow and cruel when 
talking of a girl uptown. How little that old 
man thought when he was laying down a nar- 
row judgment on another man's child that he 
was tearing out of his own heart the girl that 
he loved better than anything God had given 
him in the world. 

Take care, friends, God made you and God 
made me to be happy here and in Eternity, 
and He has told you the secret: "Love one 
another for God's sake.'' And, friends, you do, 
if you only knew it. That principle of brotherly 
love is in every heart here tonight, but you let 
it go to sleep. You are so satisfied with your 
splendidly worded prayers and your protesta- 
tions of brotherly love and your profession of 
charity, that you never awake the spirit of 
Christ into your active life. But it is there, 
nevertheless, in the heart of every man worthy 
of the name. And it needs only some great 
calamity, some startling incident to awake it 
into life. 

In the great Baltimore fire, when so many 
human beings were stricken, no sooner had 

56 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

the news been telegraphed o'er the land than 
city after city sent offers of aid. The Ameri- 
can people were ready to sacrifice anything to 
help their brothers in distress. In that great 
theater fire in Qiicago, when six hundred souls 
were hurled into eternity, before the news had 
spread through town, when the first word of 
disaster had reached State street, in that city 
where we are told the souls of the merchants 
are tied down in chains of gold, the large stores 
closed their doors and wagonload after wagon- 
load of blankets and muslin went forth. No- 
body said : 'Who's going to pay ?" or "Where 
is the money coming from?'' The dead were 
lying naked in the street. Distracted men and 
women ran about, their clothes literally torn 
from their backs, and the one thought of rich 
and poor alike was to save their fellowman 
from needless pain. That big drug store on the 
corner closed up its main entrance and opened 
up its shelves of medicated cotton and band- 
ages that brothers in Christ might not endure a 
needless moment of pain. And even unto to- 
day nobody has asked: "Who is going to 
pay?" I love to think they are waiting that 
mighty day in a better land, when Jesus will 
pay them back a hundred fold. 

Friends, that same instinct of love is in 
every one of you. When you read the early 
history of the church ; when you read of these 

67 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

noble men and women who went forth into the 
arena and died for the name of Christ; when 
you read of the brave missionary bands who 
went off into the islands of the barbarians to, 
carry the light of Christianity to other nations ; 
when vou read of such noble women as Mrs. 
Booth, who has given up home and friends and 
kindred and every dollar she can lay hands 
on, and uses it for the uplifting of fallen 
women and the betterment of degraded men; 
when you read of that noble priest, Father 
Damen, who left his home and his friends and 
his country, and went off into the leper islands 
of the Pacific, and there spent his whole life 
in attending to the needs of the lowliest and 
most afflicted and most forsaken of God's crea- 
tures, and when, after years of labor and sacri- 
fice, he had contracted that loathsome disease, 
and when his body was rotting away, even 
while the life-blood was yet bubbling through 
his veins, and when the putrid flesh dropped 
from his decaying bones, how he sang the 
hymns of David and praised the name of God 
who had used him as an instrument to awaken 
the slumbering charity of the Christian world. 
Friends, when you read these records, does 
not your heart grow larger? Does not your 
soul swell up with the desire to do? Does not 
your very intelligence yearn to make the world 
better ? Don't you often cry to yourself : "Oh, 

58 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

if I could only do that! If I could only do 
some great thing for humanity! If I could 
only be a hero, and write my name on the 
scroll of fame/' — Oh, ah, you would be Chris- 
tians then, wouldn't you ? Now, isn't that fool- 
ish ! You want to be a hero — you want to do 
great things. Friends, if you are intelligent, 
thank God every day of your lives that you are 
not asked to do great things and to make great 
sacrifices. Get down on your knees every 
night, women, and thank God that the day has 
gone by when men are asked to die like dogs 
to prove themselves true Christians. Thank 
God the days are past and gone — I hope for- 
ever — when Christian men and women must 
spill their blood to show themselves followers 
of Christ. 

No, friends, God does not ask Christian men 
and women of the twentieth century to die. 
He asks of you and me something grander, 
something nobler. He wants you to live — to 
live the life of Christ in a world of sin. And 
you can do it. There is not a day of your life 
that you could not be a Christ to some poor 
creature. It is not the big things that make 
up life. Perhaps there is not one of us here 
tonight who will ever have really a great or 
heroic event in our whole life. Life is made 
up of the little things — the kind words, the 
pleasant smile, the friendly shake of the hand, 

59 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

the good advice given to the wayward, an hour 
spent by the sick-bed of the poor and the mis- 
erable. These are little things, yes, but they 
are the things that make up the lives of ninety- 
nine per cent of God's people. There is not a 
day of your life that you could not bring sun- 
light, ever so little, into some other life. 

Take a little homely example. You have 
hundreds of them in your city. It need not be 
an old grey-haired mother, tottering on the 
verge of the grave. Take a woman in middle 
life. She has a boy growing up, fifteen or sev- 
enteen or nineteen years of age. He is much 
the same as the other boys in town. He is not 
any better, he is certainly no worse, but to 
that mother he is just the only boy in God's 
world. She watches him as you watch a 
flower that is ready to bloom; she is always 
thinking of the day when he will be a big, 
strong man, and how happy she will be when 
she can lean on his arm and walk down town. 
How proud she will be when she will meet you 
and introduce her son, saying: ^'Why, this is 
my boy." And one night he gets out with a 
crowd of boys and the next day his name is 
in the paper. What does it matter to you or 
to me, think you? If we could save that boy 
for his mother; if we could still make a man 
of him and make him understand the mistake 
he has made. Perhaps he is a thief, perhaps 

60 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

he is a drunkard, perhaps he is worse. What 
does it matter what he is if we could make a 
Christian man of him? If we could save him 
for his mother, for God and for society? You 
read the news at your morning meal and you 
start down to your business and you pass by 
that home. Yesterday it was a home. To- 
day it is like a grave. There is not a soul mov- 
ing about. The window shades are drawn 
down to the very window sill. Would Jesus 
pass by that house that morning? Don't you 
know that behind those drawn curtains a 
mother's heart is breaking? Open the gate 
and go in. Knock on the door. Perhaps she 
has been one of these hospitable women. When 
you went there before she opened the door 
wide and receivd you with both hands. She 
won't this m.orning. Ah, friends, I have stud- 
ied every detail of the picture. She will open 
the door just a little bit, and she stands back in 
the shadow, her eyes are on the floor. She 
don't dare look you in the face. She fears — 
she fears she will read condemnation in your 
face. Open the door and go in. Take that 
broken-hearted mother by the hand. She don't 
want your money. There is no need of a long 
talk. You need not speak a word. The human 
soul understands sympathy. Take that mother 
by the hand; look into her eyes like a man. 
She understands what it means. It means : "I 

61 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

do not believe your boy is all bad, even if he has 
done wrong. I do not believe your boy is a 
criminal just because he has made one mistake. 
And I am one of the men of this town who 
is going to stand with you and the boy if he 
wants to do right. We'll show the boy that 
there is lots of power in the Church of Christ 
to make a man of him, even if he has made a 
mistake in life. We'll teach him that there is 
lots of room at the head of the ladder for a 
boy, even if he has done wrong, if he wants 
to turn back and strive for virtue and for right. 
I am one of the men in this town who believes 
we need men too much to let even one of our 
boys go to hell," 

Now go on down to your work, and do you 
know you will hum tunes that you haven't 
thought of for years, and you will whistle 
snatches of songs and the fellows around you 
will be saying: '1 wonder what is the matter 
with John today?" And you do not know 
yourself. The world seems broader and wider 
and grander. The heavens seem clearer. It is 
your heart, man, it is your heart!* God has 
come into your life, and is showering back a 
hundred fold into your soul the little ray of 
sunlight that you have brought into a broken 
heart that morning. Friends, try it, and see if 
I am talking theory or the practical side of life. 

God made you, and God made me to be 

63 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

happy here and happy in Eternity. The test of 
any doctrine then must be the test of happi- 
ness. Who is the happy man in this world? 
Is he the rich man? Is the rich man happy? 
Friends, can you think of a single millionaire 
tonight whom you consider really happy ? Who, 
then, is the happy man? Is it the ordinary 
rich man, the man that we speak of as the rich 
man of our town ? He lives in a great palatial 
residence on the outskirts of the town, and the 
house is closed up all summer. His wife is 
away in Europe, his daughters are off to their 
watering place, and his boys are on an auto- 
mobiling tour or a yachting cruise, and the old 
man is down in the office attending to business. 
Is that happiness? Who, then, is the happy 
man? Is it you or I, the ordinary man, who 
goes out today or tomorrow or the next day 
and has a business deal with his neighbor, 
squeezes the dollars out of him — you get the 
better of the deal and he gets the worst of it. 
Are you happy ? I will admit you are satisfied. 
There is a certain satisfaction. You have ac- 
complished what you started out to do, but 
are you happy? You come home tired and 
nervous and irritable. You sit down to your 
supper and the prattle of the children annoys 
you ; you try to read your evening paper, and 
the children must be sent to bed early. You 
can't stand their prattle. And after a little 

63 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

while you go into your own room and undress 
and roll into bed. Are you happy ? You can't 
rest. You roll on one side and you can't sleep, 
and you shift onto the other side, and you can't 
rest. You are scheming how you are going to 
catch the other fellows tomorrow. That is all 
you get out of it. 

Who, then, is the happy person? Is it the 
young man or the young woman that goes out 
tonight or. tomorrow night or some other night 
to a dance or a ball, and they dance till two 
or three o'clock in the morning, and, as the 
boys say, they have a "high old time," and he 
sees the girl home, and she lives away out in 
the suburbs, and he wonders why in God's 
name she don't move into civilization, and he 
gets home at three or four o'clock. The sun 
is making faces at him o'er the horizon. And 
he slinks into his own room, and he takes off 
one shoe, and it goes ''plunk" on the floor, and 
he takes off the other, and it goes ''thud ;" and 
his mother sits up in bed and says: "Oh, 
Tommy got home!" Yes, are you happy, 
boys ? You roll into bed and you say to your- 
self : "Well, ain't I a chump !" 

Who, then, is the happy man? 

Friends, have you ever seen a picture of 
happiness? A little white cottage in the half- 
deserted street on the outskirts of your city 
about six o'clock of an evening. There is 

64 




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THE POWER OF LOVE 

swinging on the front gate a little, golden- 
haired boy, and every little while he pokes his 
head away out, trying to see down the street, 
and after a little while there comes round the 
corner a man in blue overalls and discolored 
shirt — hands and face begrimed with toil — but 
little golden hair, swinging on the gate, gives a 
cry of delight, and jumping down from his 
perch, runs along the street, his hands are ex- 
tended toward that toil-stained man, and there 
is a look of heaven in his eyes as he cries: 
"Pop ! Pop V And that tired man stoops down 
and raises up the little bundle of pink and 
white, and the kiss of an angel is on his lips! 
and I tell you all the gold in all the world and 
all the powers of kings could not buy that baby 
from that father who loves him. All day long 
he has labored in the shop or factory, and the 
sweat has poured down his forehead and 
dropped upon his work, but to him every drop 
of sweat is a source of joy. It is a testimony 
of faith to his baby and the woman whom he 
loves. Go back into that kitchen in the little 
cottage and see there another slave, if you will, 
a slave of love. All day she has worked, and 
since five o'clock her heart has been at the 
gate. But no, she let the baby go, and she re- 
mained within that supper might be ready and 
everything in order when 'Top'' and the baby 
came home. Friends, if this is not happiness — 

65 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

if this is not a glimpse of heaven — I know not 
how to paint the favor of God. 

Who is the happy man? I need not tell 
you, friends. Your own intelligence has read 
it in the faces of hundreds of men and women 
who have tried to make the world better be- 
cause they have lived. The happy person is 
not the man who has made money and ac- 
quired fame and holds power. The happy soul 
is the one, who, lying down weary at night, 
may say: "Thank God for today, for I have 
made one soul happy because I have lived.'' 
And this is not my idea, but it is the decision 
of God on the life of man. You will find that 
mandate of God in the very first page of crea- 
tion. When God had created Adam as a per- 
fect man, surrounded him with all the favors 
and all the blessings that man could desire, 
placed him in that garden of Eden, where 
every beauty dwelt, and still you will remem- 
ber, God looked down upon that man, and God 
pitied him. Pitied a man who had everything 
his soul could crave^ and God said: 'Tt is not 
good for man to be alone.'' And why? Be- 
cause Adam was made to the image and the 
likeness of the eternal God — an intelligent 
creature — and therefore he could be happy 
only by imitating God, to whose image he 
was made, and though he had everything that 
his heart could desire, he would never be 

66 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

happy until God gave him another intelligent 
creature to whom he could give every favor 
and every blessing that God had bestowed 
upon him. It was the law of hapiness. 

Follow this out in the life of every man. 
Have you ever seen a young man in love? 
Most people look upon this period of love as a 
laughable incident. Well, I will admit the 
young man in love does many ridiculous things, 
but to me there are few things in the world 
more sacred than the days of a budding love. 
To me it is God drawing two pure souls nearer 
and nearer and nearer together, that He may 
show them the supreme life in the golden 
school of love. But have you ever studied out 
the details? Have you ever seen a young 
man in love? Is he happy? The most miser- 
able creature in God's world. We will all 
agree on that, it seems. There is a young 
man, and he is in love, and he is unhappy. Now 
have you ever figured out how that young man 
tries to make himself happy? He runs down 
town and he buys candy enough to give the 
girl dyspepsia the rest of her life. Christmas 
rolls around, and he buys jewelry that an In- 
dian squaw wouldn't wear. The girl always 
had enough to eat and enough to wear, but to 
watch that young man running with packages 
to her house, you would think she never had a 
decent stitch. What is the matter with the 

67 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

fellow ? There is not anything the matter with 
him. He is a man, a man made to the image 
and the likeness of the eternal God, and he is 
just carrying out the God instinct that the 
Creator placed in him. In that girl that he 
loves all humanity is idealized, and he will 
never be happy until he has bestowed upon 
her every favor and every blessing that God 
has given him. It is the law of life, it is the 
law of happiness. 

Friends, the trouble with the average man is 
this: We are looking for great things, for 
great opportunities to do good, but we over- 
look the real necessities of an every-day life. 
Sometimes an insignificant act that you and I 
might laugh at as folly has been the changing 
point of a human life. I remember a little 
story in my own life. You might almost laugh 
at me for telling it, but to me it seems the 
power that called me nearer to God. 

Some time ago I lectured in Fond du Lac, 
Wisconsin, and after my lecture a large num- 
ber of people came in to see me and shake 
hands with me, as I was well known there, 
and during the talk with many old friends I 
noticed a young girl. She had an opportunity 
several times to speak to me, but she seemed 
to hang back, and I thought was waiting for 
the others to go. After most of the people had 
retired, the young girl came forward and spoke 

68 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

to me. She said: *Tather, I know you have 
noticed my hanging back and not speaking to 
you when I had an opportunity, while the oth- 
ers were here, but I wanted to talk to you for 
a moment alone. I wanted to thank you for a 
kind word that you spoke years ago. I wanted 
to tell you that I have thought of you every 
night for ten y«^ars." I remember laughing at 
her, and telling her it was a peculiar confession 
to make — that she had been thinking of the 
priest every night for ten years — but she an- 
swered : "I knew you would laugh at me, but 
I just felt that I must tell you.'' And then she 
went on and told me the story, and it all came 
back to me as she related the incident. I had 
been in Fond du Lac about ten or eleven 
years before that. I was not a priest at the 
time. Getting up one morning I took a stroll 
down the main street before breakfast. The 
little children were just on their way to school, 
and as I passed along I noticed a little golden- 
haired darling dragging her feet along the 
pavement. She had a long strap, held in one 
hand, with two little books wrapped in the end 
of it, and with her other hand she was mop- 
ping her eyes. I remember, just in a spirit of 
mischief, going up to the child and patting 
her on the head and saying: "Hello, baby, 
what is the matter with vou?" I remember 
how she looked up at me with her great, big, 

69 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

blue eyes, swimming with tears. She said she 
was going to school and she didn't know her 
lesson. She had such a cross teacher, she 
knew she would be punished, and she just 
knew she would call on her because she didn't 
know her lesson. I laughed at the child's fears, 
and said to her : ''I wouldn't feel so bad about 
it. ' Perhaps I can help you out — I went to 
school a few days m.yself. Let me see your 
book and your lesson." And she unwound 
her strap and opened her little book and 
showed me her lesson. It was just as I ex- 
pected. Though the lesson covered an entire 
page, there was only one or two thoughts in 
the whole thing, and I said to the child : *'Now, 
see here, dear, if the teacher calls on you this 
morning, if she asks you such and such a ques- 
tion, don't try to tell her what is in the book, 
but just answer this way," and I gave her the 
exact words of the answer, "and if she asks 
you this other question, just answer this," and 
I went on formulating the lesson into two or 
three questions and answers. We went over 
the matter three or four times. By that time 
we had reached the square where the school 
was located, and, as we had a few moments be- 
fore the bell rang, I went over the lesson once 
more with the child. Then the bell rang, and 
the little thing looked up once more with her 

70 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

great trusting blue eyes. I gave her the book, 
saying: "Now remember!" 

The little one ran across the street and up 
the school steps, and that was the last I thought 
of it. But it was not the last for the child. She 
went into school that morning, and sure 
enough the teacher called on her in class, and 
when she asked the question the little thing 
stood up and just popped out the answer, and 
the teacher was surprised, and she told her 
that was very good, and just to try her she 
asked her the second question and the little 
thing just popped out the second answer the 
same way, and the teacher was very much 
pleased, and the little girl was perfectly de- 
lighted because she knew her lesson, and the 
day passed a red letter day for her, and she 
went home happy as a bird. And when school 
hours were over, with the other children she 
played herself tired, and when at night her 
mother called her in and taking ofif her little 
clothes prepared her for bed, kneeling at her 
mother's knee she prayed the old accustomed 
prayer — prayed for father and mother, and 
sister and brother, and aunts and uncles and 
friends, and when at last her mother thought 
that it was time to say "Amen," the little angel 
had one more prayer. Clasping her hands to- 
gether she raised her eyes to heaven and 

71 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

prayed: "GOD, MAKE THAT BIG MAN 
GOOD !" 

Friends, you may laugh, you may laugh at 
the absurdity of my telling you that foolish 
story, but if you knew what it meant to me, if 
you knew how near I have stood to the brink 
of hell and looked down into its very depths, 
if you knew how often the devil has struggled 
for my soul, if you knew how often one step 
more might have meant perdition, you would 
not wonder that I love to think, since I have 
heard that girl's story, that when the devil 
wrestled for a soul, a mightier power was bat- 
tling on my side: a pure girl was kneeling at 
her mother's knee, and praying: "GOD, 
MAKE THAT BIG MAN GOOD." 

This much I know, friends, some power 
stronger than my own drew me into the 
Church of God. Some power beyond my mere 
will made it possible for me to throw away the 
world and preach the gospel of Christ, and I 
cannot but feel that it was the power of love : 
That one sunny morning in a little city God 
looked down upon a young man, standing on 
the corner of a busy street, teaching a golden- 
haired baby a primer lesson, and God so valued 
that lesson that He said : "I will draw you to 
myself, and I will give you the power to wring 
hearts and to enthuse souls and to enlighten 

73 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

minds, because you have been kind to her — ^to 
one little one/' 

Friends, don't lose your opportunities. A 
single kind act may be the glory of your life 
and the salvation of another. 

But, friends, I needs must pause. I have not 
finished the story of love. It is like God's 
great world, rolling on in a circle. There is 
no beginning, there is no end. And, friends, 
let us take to ourselves, into our hearts, into 
oiir everyday life, the story of love as far as 
we have read it tonight. 

Is there any place in God's world where it 
should be so easy for men to love one another 
for God's sake as here in the glorious United 
States of America, where every page of your 
history tells the story of some noble man or 
noble woman, who sacrificed all he or she held 
dear in life in order that you and I might be 
free and gloriously independent? Is there any 
land in God's great world that so cries out for 
brotherly love as this land of freedom, where 
every foot of the precious soil is fertilized 
with the blood of a martyr ? Would you know 
your duty as American citizens? Then realize 
that every stone of the glorious temple of lib- 
erty is cemented to its fellow with the heart's 
blood of a patriot. Our forefathers reared up 
the glorious temple of liberty with pain and 
sacrifice and bloodshed, and they have left it to 

73 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

you and to me to put into that temple of lib- 
erty the spirit of brotherly love, the spirit of 
God, that there may not be a man or a woman 
or a child in all this temple of liberty, in all this 
land of freedom, that may not be truly free 
and intelligently happy. 

Would you know the story of American cit- 
izenship — of brotherly love? Do not take the 
story from me. Go ask some old Grand Army 
man. He will tell you a story something like 
this : He will describe to you a little white cot- 
tage nestling back in the velvety green hills 
of New Hampshire way back in the early six- 
ties. He w^ill describe to you a plot of green, 
surrounded by a whitewashed picket fence ; he 
will tell you of a little flower garden nestling 
in the heart of the green. And one morning 
the door is opened. Go in, and there you will 
see a New England home. The carpet on the 
floor is woven by mother's own hands ; the 
pictures and mottoes and frames on the walls 
are made by mother and daughters ; the old 
rocker over in the corner with the ruffled pil- 
low lying in the seat ; the little sprig of broom 
growing out of an earthen vase over on the 
window sill ; everything there cries out ^*Home, 
Sweet Home." And one morning way back in 
the sixties there stands in tlie middle of the 
floor a soldier dressed in blue, and by his side 
is a woman dressed m a calico wrapper, her 

74 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

soul is in her eyes, both hands clasp his shoul- 
ders. She cannot speak — some grief is too 
much for words. The little children are run- 
ning around pulling her wrapper and saying: 
"Mamma, mamma, where is papa going?" and 
she cannot answer. A great lump rises in her 
throat. She starts, for they hear the roll of the 
drum and the bugle call and the tramp, tramp, 
tramp. The soldiers are coming down the 
street. She follows him to the door, staggers 
on to the gate, and with swimming eyes sees 
him join the ranks of the" soldiers, pick up the 
step, pass on down the road, over the hill, and 
out of her sight forever. 

Follow them on — follow them on down into 
the South. See these Northern soldiers rise 
up with the first streaks of dawn, see them 
start off on their long march over that wild 
country, devastated by the enemy — ten, twenty, 
thirty miles over a land in desolation. Every- 
thing is burnt away. The very water is pol- 
luted, and hour after hour these men of the 
North march on, the hot Southern sun beat- 
ing down upon their half-protected heads, and 
just as night comes on, down from the forest 
the enemy sweeps upon them, and they fight, 
man to man, horse to horse, until God lets 
down the dark curtain of night to shut out the 
accursed scene. And then there are moans and 
groans in the darkness, and the ghastly moon 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

steals up into the sky and throws out her 
trembling arms o'er the world. And now, now 
you can see it — the world in desolation, j^en 
in blue and gray who looked with hate into 
one another's eyes and tried to shoot away the 
life of a brother, have crept close together to 
die in the trembling twilight. Men and horses 
lie heaped in confusion. Men with their limbs 
torn from their body, men with their throats 
cut, and men with their scalps lying bare and 
their heads raised to Heaven, and they are 
crying: 'Water! my God! water!" and in all 
God's world there is not a soul to answer. Yes, 
there is an answer. See, there come two 
women, stealing over the battlefieldj creeping 
along under the beams of the moon. Is it 
some mother, come out to look for her son in 
the midst of death? Is it some woman who 
seeks the man to whom she has pledged her 
love? Ah, no. The cross of Christ is on her 
breast, the bonnet of St. Vincent on her head. 
Two little Sisters of Charity, alone with God 
and night. How they move without fear 
through that valley of death and of darkness ! 
How tenderly they stoop o'er each dying sol- 
dier! For them there is no North or South, 
no blue or gray, no nationality, no creed, no 
denomination. In every soldier's upturned 
face they see the face of Christ. How tender- 
ly they moisten the parched lips, how they cool 

76 



THE POWER OF LOVE 

the fevered brow, how they close the gaping 
wound, how they murmur words of consola- 
tion in the dying ear, how they take a last 
message to bring back to the mother and the 
wife and the loved ones far away! Even 
there — even in the death and the blood and 
the carnage of battle — the power of love rules 
supreme. And stamped forever on that flag — 
the Stars and Stripes — stamped forever is that 
lesson of love, that as it leads on in the van- 
guard of civilization it may teach to the world 
America's storv: the fatherhood of God and 
the brotherhood of man — the glorious, the 
splendid lesson of love. | 



77 



AUG 8 m? 



l^tthlisittt'ti ^ote. 



All of Father Vaughan's lectures will be 
published in the very near future. Each lec- 
ture will be printed in a volume by itself, same 
size and binding as this. Thus, when all the 
volumes are oil the press, they will form a 
handsome, as well as interesting, set for the 
library. 

The second volume to be issued will be "Ser- 
mons From Shakespeare.'' 

Holbrook-Barker Co. 
Chicago, June 20, 1907. 



AUG 8 1907 



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